Alone Again
by fortywinters
Summary: Sherlock Holmes has finally found a puzzle he can't quite solve - one that comes in the shape of John Watson. Pre-Reichenbach, from Sherlock's POV - thus a bit tricky to write. Thanks for reading me!
1. I: Nocturnal Me

_Chapter One_

Before him, I lay alone in my bed, wide-eyed, staring into the ceiling, bored with the necessity to sleep, to be ordinary like everyone else who lies still and breathing at night. Mostly, I was kept awake by my mind, my mind that screamed and whispered observations and deductions to me, always. Cases tormented me at night, unsolvable ones, until finally my mind and I understood; my only pleasure on those nights was in waking up Lestrade and all of Scotland Yard. I was not kind when my mind took me over, which was nearly always. It didn't let me sleep, let me eat until I had solved things. Now that John's here, though, my mind and I are on better terms. I'm not it's hostage anymore.

Sometimes, when I had the flat to myself, I would wake and pace and practice adagios in place of thinking; the bow was my friend when I had no case to ponder, no reason to sleep. No stimulus. Mrs. Hudson would come twittering into the flat, all flapping hands and scolding.

"Now _really_, Sherlock, it's one o' clock in the morning, and an old lady needs her rest. Driving me to tears with that violin of yours, playing at all hours…"

But I would know she hadn't been sleeping.

_Eyes bloodshot, though not wet anymore – her cheeks, though, a little half-dried tear next to a liver spot just beneath her right eye. Sleeves are wet – she's wiped them away and doesn't want me to know, just like her. She's been crying and stopped – five minutes ago? Three and half, yes. And her knees – she's been kneeling, praying – yes, still clasping her hands under her chin – crying and praying. Dull, dull woman. _

"Dreadfully sorry, Mrs. Hudson," I would say in my most apologetic voice, and she would smile. "You know how terrible I am at sleeping and things."

"You'll be the death of me, playing concertos at God-knows-when in the morning," she would sigh, but she didn't mean it. "Go to bed."

"I'll try my very hardest, Mrs. Hudson. Goodnight." And I would close the door, lock it, and hear her creaking down the stairs.

Then I'd leave through the window and run. I'd run from nothing. I liked to do it, in the dark, through alleyways, up fire escapes, on rooftops, over and under shadows, almost conversing with the city's dark crags, the asphalt. Home by morning. Alone again.


	2. II: Can You Tell

_Chapter Two_

When John Watson first came, I wasn't sure what to make of him, apart from the usual things.

An occasionally useful acquaintance of mine, Mike Stamford, had brought him to me, aware of my need for a flatmate. I asked Mike to borrow his phone as soon as he entered the lab, but he was without one. John, who I had noticed quietly limping in behind him, offered his own almost at once.

_Quick to share, to please others, to play fair. A soldier, judging by his gait, haircut, height, eyes and shoelaces. A decent man. Probably a good one._

He was short, around five foot seven, though not small – his presence was large. He held himself well, despite his injuries; he tried not to lean on his cane for support, to stand in front of me and appraise me as I was him. He had wide blue eyes and close-cropped, sandy hair (which was beginning to grow into a wave across his forehead – obviously he had neglected to do anything about it since he had been injured; he didn't care – and streaked at the temples with grey). He dressed smartly for one so shaken. His eyes flickered over my face, my clothing – and held my gaze for a moment. I had not known anyone to look into my eyes – not properly – in a long time. His eyes were clear and warm and unflinching.

"Afghanistan or Iraq?" I asked him, after taking the proffered phone from his hand.

He stood there, mouth hanging agape, with that dumbfounded look of one who's just been told a very startling, unpleasant piece of news. I could tell his life was indeed news to him – though when I eyed his expression, he closed his mouth promptly.

"Sorry?" Mike looked bemusedly from me to him as a look of incomprehension flitted across John's face.

"Which was it, Afghanistan or Iraq?" He was struck dumb at that, and I couldn't help but smile internally at the look on his face.

"How do you feel about the violin?"

"Sorry, what?" I was still amused at his lack of understanding, his bafflement at me.

"I like to play the violin when I'm thinking. Sometimes I don't talk for days on end – would that bother you? Potential flatmates should know the worst about each other." I smiled as he became locked in some kind of internal deduction of his own for a brief moment.

"Are you – you told him about me?" said John to Mike, who merely shook his head. "Not a word."

"Then who said anything about flatmates?" said John to my turned back, his voice level despite his incredulity.

"I did. Told Mike this morning that I must be a difficult man to find a flatmate for. Now here he is with an old friend, clearly just home from military service in Afghanistan," I said quickly as I shrugged into my coat and wrapped my scarf around my neck. "Wasn't a difficult leap."

John looked at the floor, then me. "How did you know about Afghanistan?"

"I've got a nice little place in central London. Together we ought to be able to afford it. Meet there tomorrow evening, seven o' clock."

"Is that it?" he asked, somewhat affronted.

"Is that what?"

"We've only just met, and we're going to go look at a flat."

"Problem?"

"We don't know a thing about each other. I don't know where we're meeting, I don't even know your name."

"My mind moved into its highest gear and I drew in a breath, looking at John again. "I know you're an army doctor, recently invalided home from Afghanistan. I know you've got a brother who's concerned about you, but you won't go to him for help because you don't approve of him - possibly because he's an alcoholic; more likely because he recently walked out on his wife - and I know your therapist thinks your limp's at least partially psychosomatic - quite correctly, I'm afraid. Enough to be going on with, don't you think? The name's Sherlock Holmes and the address is 221B Baker Street. Afternoon!"

Something began then. For once in my life, I wasn't entirely sure of what was happening. It confused me, frustrated me, suffocated me as only a good puzzle could – but it was a new something. A new stimulus, a new problem – John Watson.


	3. III: Draw Your Swords

_Chapter Three_

The first few weeks with John were difficult. I had never cohabited with anyone beyond my days at Cambridge, and before then, there had only been Mycroft and Mummy, both like me. I drove myself half-mad trying to make him understand things, make him grasp the mere rudiments of what was flying through my mind, my body. The cases we took together required a good deal of simplistic explanations and wild gesticulating in order for him to come to conclusions. Of course, this hurt his pride: he thought I thought him stupid. How like small-minded people to be offended at the suggestion of inferiority, but then, he wasn't inferior, stupid; there were times he was nearly a leap ahead of me, though I dared not admit it. There was a quick intelligence in his blue eyes, one, though not nearly as sharp and evolved, that could match and change my own.

We were soon plunging through cases and running from danger together, through the London night, feeling invincible – and to be quite honest, I liked having him with me. I liked laughing like misbehaving schoolboys about to be caught. I liked rowing with him over who was to get the milk – it was something to say, something to do where there hadn't been anything before. And I could deduce with relative ease that he liked it too. He liked the violin and the running and the corpses and dismembered remains that usually inhabited the refrigerator, though he groaned about it when he could. He was as irritating as anyone else – making it public knowledge that I wasn't aware that the Earth revolved around the sun was especially annoying. Of course he never hesitated to let me know that I was being a smug git or a snide, calculating excuse for a human being. Obviously I carried on.

Most of all, I liked the way he looked at me, without cringing. His eyes never wavered from my own when they met. His eyes were so blue, so brightly blue and so steady, and I couldn't help feeling they knew me. Like friends' eyes do.

That word kept me awake at night. Friend. It wasn't a term I had ever accorded to anyone in my life – except my violin, secretly. But it didn't laugh and talk and breathe. It was silent without me, which I had thought I liked. But John was full of ideas, able to follow me into whatever street-lit danger I asked him to. Friends do that for friends.

Friends.

One day John asked me what it was like, being me. What I did, really, in my head, where the deductions came from. We had been sitting by the fireplace in our chairs, I rosining my bow, he reading the paper quietly. It was mid-morning, and the flat was flooded with watery sunlight. John had made tea, and watched the steam curl absently into nothingness as I worked the rosin over and over the hairs of the bow. I told him what I normally tell people.

"I observe everything. From what I observe, I deduce everything. When I've eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how mad it might seem, must be the truth."

"That's what you tell everyone though, isn't it?" he said, rustling the folds of his newspaper and finally setting on the spindly-legged table next to him. "Come on, Sherlock, it's got to be more than looking really hard at something through your little magnifying… thing."

I couldn't tell if I was incensed or wanted to laugh. I kept my face stony and expressionless.

"A gift, then, if you're simple enough to believe in 'God-given talents.' It's not special or fantastic. It's a skill, which is all humans have got. Clearly in some less than others," I added, grinning a little too widely for my own good. John gave a loud, whooping cough that didn't disguise the word "Anderson". We laughed, and were silent again.

"I think it's extraordinary, what you can do," he said after a while. "Really extraordinary, even if it's 'just a skill.' Really." I could tell he meant what he said. I usually could, with John.

"Do you think so?" He had said it before, and I still lapped it up like an eager child every time.

"I do," he said, standing and stretching. "Even if you're the most exasperating, aggravating flatmate I've ever had to tolerate and you make me want to hurt innocent children sometimes."

For a moment, I couldn't tell if he was joking or not. He was grinning – with what? Sarcasm? Amusement at his own cleverness? I still hadn't decided when he pulled on his coat and began down the stairs, calling "I'm going to the shops," as he left.

"John – John! What do you mean?" I ran to the door and shouted after him.

"Sherlock Holmes baffled? Could it be?" he said, teasing. "It's a joke, Sherlock. The concept might be a bit foreign to you but us normal people tend to employ it pretty frequently."

"Ha ha," I said sarcastically.

"No, but really," he said, serious again. "You're not a bad chap and you wouldn't make a bad friend if you worked on it a bit. See you later." And with that last joke, he was gone.

Friend. I would be a good friend.


	4. IV: Such Great Heights

_Chapter Four_

John changed me, in some ways. My silences grew shorter and the days grew longer, because now I had someone to talk to, the throw ideas and deductions at. I had someone to eat dinner with (when I ate) and to watch crap telly and the occasional football match with, someone to abuse Anderson with. Someone to run from danger with, knowing we'd be safe if we made it through together. I had someone who would willingly die for me. That was the strangest thing of all. John's loyalty.

That evening in the pool, when John stood before me, speaking Moriarty's words, ready to give up his own life in exchange for my own, my heart (a creature which rarely, if at all, reared its head) leapt and plummeted, diving and twisting as it fell through the air without anyone to catch it. I couldn't let him die for me. Not for me.

As soon as I had ripped the overcoat and poorly-fashioned IEDs from his body, my breath came ragged and my voice hoarse. My friend, my best friend John Watson had nearly been killed because of me, because of knowing me. I was disgusted with myself, that I had led him here and that he would not question following. It plagued and paralyzed me: if he were to die for me, I would be alone again, without him, his subtle cleverness, his stupid habits, his fondness for Doctor Who, his steady eyes that knew me just as I knew him. I introduced him as my flatmate, but he called me friend. My friend, John Watson.

I pretended that I didn't care about him, but I did. That's what terrified me: sentiment was a chemical defect found in the losing side. I had begun to lose, to lose against John Watson.

I didn't care, not normally. I didn't care about victims, killers, and thieves, nor did I care about the idiots I was forced to go through to get to them. I hadn't cared about Mycroft in a long time. The Adler woman was a fleeting diversion. But John – he was my best mate, a phrase I had never accorded to anyone before. For him to die would be – what? Merely a puzzle again, with nothing to make its pieces fit together anymore.

Another day, we sat side by side on a bench in Hyde Park, watching people pass. It was a dreary sort of day, like many during a London autumn. John was sipping coffee and tossing breadcrumbs from a paper bag to a flock of wayward pigeons; I was watching the passers-by, deducing from afar their lives.

_Him. Balding, fat, moderately intelligent. Forty-two and half years old; married with one child who has a congenital heart defect. Works for BT and cheated with the nanny. Unhappy. Distinctly unhappy. _

_Her. Twenty-seven and three quarters of a year old. Born in Cornwall, raised in Kent. Educated? In America, most likely at Brown. Mother died of cancer when she was eight. Boyfriend is uninterested in her and probably gay. Unhappy. Distinctly unhappy. _

_Him. Five years and two months old. Wants to be an aeroplane or a purple crayon when he grows up. Parents are settling a nasty divorce. Father is an alcoholic. Likes cows. Happy as he is. _

"Do you think of death much, John?" I asked, rather abruptly. He threw a handful of breadcrumbs a bit too hard into the sea of pigeons, which took to the air as though affronted.

He drew in a long breath. "Only when I've got to." He was remembering Afghanistan and lying through his teeth.

"Do you think they do?" I replied, indicating the passers-by with a shake of my head in their direction. John looked surprised at me.

"No –"

Here John paused for a moment, unsure of what to say next. He looked towards the sky, and milky clouds were reflected in his eyes. "– not really, Sherlock. I mean, it's a thought that kind of comes over you in the middle of the night, wondering what's it's like, if you'll die alone, what comes after. That sort of thing."

"Do you?" I tried to make my voice gentler, more human, but it came out sounding forced and flinty. John's face clouded. He was thinking.

"Almost always," he whispered. My heart reeled and writhed again; we were the same.

He took another shuddering breath. "Almost always, Sherlock. My dad died when I eleven. Great man, he was. Killed in action. I'm – I'm always thinking about it, since Afghanistan. Dreaming about it. I can't help but think that someday, somehow –" John cut himself short, and I longed to know what he would have said.

"You'll die?" I asked.

"No, no. It's – it doesn't matter." I left it at that.

After a long, pregnant silence, John lifted his head, turned, and looked at me so piercingly that I felt some kind of momentary shockwave pass though me.

"Do you think of it?" he asked me, eyes still trained on mine.

"Yes," I murmured. "I do. Nearly constantly."

John choked.

"I just – I just want you to know," said John, an troubled look on his face. "That if you die, I'm coming with you. I don't care where it is we go, after. I'm coming with you."

Something between us burst in the air, floated downwards and settled on us as I held John's eyes with my own.

"Thank you," I managed to whisper, after a time. "Thank you, John. You're my best friend."

"I thought I was your only one," said John with a shaky smile.

"The only and best. Always."


	5. V: Misread

_**Sorry about the delay in Chapter Five. I'm quite happy with how the fic's going - the only thing about writing Sherlock is that you can't describe all of the adorably irksome things he does. Anyways, I hope you enjoy, and thanks to my readers for the reviews. You're excellent.**_

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><p><em>Chapter Five<em>

Sometimes, when we were alone, in silence, we observed one another. Of course, John didn't know I knew he was watching me, stealing the occasional glance at me from over his book – but I could see those dark blue eyes steal over me. I didn't mind it – I liked the thought of him wondering at what was in my mind, what thoughts slept behind my eyes. I could watch him for minutes on end and never have him know. I found myself enumerating the things I liked about him.

His eyes. Steady. Piercing. They didn't cringe away from my own, screaming _"Freak, freak…" _

His face, bent in concentration over his copy of _For Whom the Bell Tolls_. He liked Hemingway, him and his bloody, warlike imagery. A soldier would, I thought. I could see the words moving through his head, but as to his thoughts, I had no idea. His face let me read him as best I could, but my grasp of his thoughts and mind was weak. He was the first person who had done this to me, and I liked it. It was another challenge, another puzzle.

He had very careful hands, hands that sewed and scalpelled and had held life between their palms. He was a doctor, and kept them clean at all times. The fingers were short, and the backs of his hands had raised, prominent veins. The hands tapered into fine-boned wrists, wrists that I couldn't help but want to encircle with my hands sometimes –

But I was being stupid and sentimental. I didn't want to touch John; the idea became nearly repulsive as soon as I acknowledged that I had had it. That instinct to touch was base and primal, a defect that usually meant love. But I had had the thought, and it wouldn't stop running through my mind, no matter how much I wished it would vanish. I didn't want anything from John. He was my best friend and I was losing my senses for him: _stupid, stupid, stupid. How terribly, terribly human_.

But at the same time, the sensation of hurling myself, falling into something unknown and uncharted was beyond compare.

I never betrayed myself when I watched him back, save for one time. We both lifted our eyes at the same moment, and caught one another in a covert look. It was raining, and his eyes were the same colour as the weeping sky. We held our eyes there for nearly thirty seconds before I dropped mine, unable to feel what I was feeling anymore. A thrill of pure terror and sadness and inexplicable, painful ecstasy at his eyes had run me through. I stood and would have run, were it not for my peculiarly unresponsive feet, directly to my bedroom. Instead I could only stumble and half-slam the door behind me. I heard John sigh, and for once, I couldn't detect what it said.

I picked up my violin and began something by Saint-Saëns, something I had forced myself to learn to stave off the boredom, long before John. _Le cygne_ – the Swan.

_Breathe. _I picked up the bow and pulled it over the strings. A rich, quavering G fell forward and flew upwards, hanging in the air until it transformed into a D, then an A. _Breathe. _

I began. I had not played it in some time, but it was there still; the muscles of my hands remembered it. It was sweet, quiet, andante. An elegy for a swan, a dirge for someone forgotten. Every note that poured from my violin I longed for him to hear and listen to, in exchange for all he had given me. He had shown me friendship when no one else could, companionship when I had made myself into a pariah. He deserved this music.

The rain beat my time on the roof and my eyes were shut, hearing nothing but the music and his voice, ever-present inside of my head. I saw his eyes flicker and my heart did another of its odd flying dives. Still, the notes came – came with more passion, more nuance than I had ever known myself to be able to produce. There was that instinct again – this time to give him every sadness I had ever known, to show him how he'd nearly fixed me. Nearly fixed me but for this mind of mine.

Love, I murmured, as the music sung through the air around me.

_No, idiot,_ hissed a contemptuous voice in my mind. _You can't have friends, you weakling – you can't _love –

John opened the door abruptly; I dropped my violin and bow to floor and backed against the wall, feeling trapped. I avoided his eyes but part of me needed to fix on them, so I did. Deep blue, like the sky before a summer night.

"Are you alright?" asked John, as though I had somehow hurt myself while alone in the room. He took two steps forward.

"I'm fine," I lied.

"No, you're not," he said. He didn't trust my answer. "You haven't played like that since I've known you. Something's wrong."

"I'm just a little distracted by the Notting-Merewether case. Violent, you'll remember. And the children implicated –"

"Don't talk about it," he groaned, swallowing the lie. "Enough to keep you up at night. Makes me sick."

Silence, again; so often we had nothing and everything to say. I looked out the window at the pouring rain, and when I looked back to John, he was making a careful study of me. I could almost interpret the look in his eyes, but that swooping sensation returned to me as I met his gaze.

"The piece was beautiful," he said. "The Swan. The way you played it was –"

"Thank you."

"– extraordinary, like it was dying."

"Thank you."

After a few moments, John seemed to collect his wits and straighten. His eye strayed to the floor, where my violin and bow lay. One of the ebony tuning pegs had snapped off. John bent to retrieve the instrument and the bow, examining them with a frown on his face.

"I'm so sorry, Sherlock."

I was perplexed. "What for?" I asked.

"I made you drop it, stupid. Let me get this fixed for you."

"No, John – it's alright, I –" I attempted to wrest it from him, but he held it to his chest.

"Look, you're going to break it. Come on. It's my fault." My best friend looked up into my face again, directly into my eyes, and I let it go.

"There's a repairman down on Harrowby Street. I'll bring it by now, I was going out anyways."

"Right," I murmured. "Thanks."

John turned to leave, the violin and bow still held against his chest.

"John, I –" I had begun before I could stop myself, those words were going to come spilling out and I would spoil everything –

"What?" he asked, halfway through the door.

"I need you to grab some milk," I breathed.

John only laughed as he left, and I found myself laughing too.


	6. VI: See The Sun

**Chapter six, finally. I've been so busy with school that I've nearly forgotten about writing this (my humble apologies). It's been a pleasure writing it though, and thanks again to all of you lovely reviewers!**

**Also, sorry for the London inaccuracies! Google Maps only gets you so far. **

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><p><em>Chapter Six<em>

I loved John.

I was certain that I did. For the first time since I had met him, I had something definite to go on, to work from. I could understand it if I worked it through my brain enough times. At night, alone in my bed, wide-eyed, staring into the ceiling. _I love you, I love you, I love you. _My best friend. The fact that I had a best friend was constantly new to me, and the fact that I loved him made it mine. The idea of him was mine to keep and hold onto when I was alone, and he, him, the vision and being of him, was mine when we were together. I tried not to think of him as "mine", but oppressing the feeling did no good. I loved him. I loved John Watson with as much of my heart as I could.

I still wasn't sure if he felt anything towards me, anything more than friendship. He and I talked late into the night, spent almost every waking hour together. We had everything to discuss, and he made my mind gleam with a new clarity that it hadn't known for a long time. I was never not on form, and he congratulated me for it as my caseload, and our shared celebrity, grew. He would clap me on the back, give my arm a squeeze, but sometimes, I felt his fingers linger between my shoulder-blades and on my vertebrae for a second longer than his subconscious deemed appropriate. He would realize that his hand was there and wrench it away, embarrassed.

I lived for those stolen moments, and the ones where we simply looked at one another. Of course, he knew nothing. He knew I was his best friend and nothing more. Still, I caught him looking troubled sometimes, gazing into the fireplace even when it wasn't lit, as though the cold ashes could tell him something he longed to know. I would ask him what was bothering him, and his eyes would dart over me. Sometimes I almost thought I was the object of his silent ruminations. The sneering voice would return and hiss in my ear: _He doesn't love you. He doesn't even want to be your friend – he _pities _you, because you're alone and friendless and loveless and you'll never be anything but that – _

Banishing the tiny, disdainful voice was difficult.

One afternoon in the spring, I was sitting at the microscope in 221B, examining a couple of hair follicles from a suspect's clothing. Incidentally, I was also feeling quite good about the world. The lilac was out in raucous shades of mauve and white all over London, the sun was shining gloriously through the window and over my face and hands, warming my skin, and a bird had made its nest outside of our bathroom window – I could hear its babies calling for it. I felt so incredibly stupid about taking pleasure in these things, things children in primary school loved – flowers, sunshine, birdies. Still, I couldn't help but feel a little cheerful at the thought that if all of the people inhabiting didn't exist, the world might be a beautiful place.

I had just removed the slide from the microscope when John hurtled up the stairs and through the door. He was panting heavily, as though he'd just sprinted a mile; his brow was shining with a thin sheen of sweat. I stood up immediately, but he was bent double, hands on his knees, chest heaving.

"John, are you –?" I asked apprehensively. He seemed to be uninjured, but frightened.

"Just – just came from the Dio – the Diogenes Club," he breathed, looking up at me. "Mycroft – Mycroft wanted a word."

"But why've you been running? Sprinting, actually. Are you sure you're alright? Do tell me Mycroft hasn't put you up to something stupid."

"No, no – on the way back, his car dropped me off down at the dodgy bit of Bingham Street. Saw this woman getting robbed – thought – thought I'd help her. Not too smart, three blokes against one and one with a knife, so I threw her the purse and ran all – all the way here," he wheezed. I couldn't help but laugh at him. It was so John to interrupt a mugging, outnumbered three to one.

"God, feel my heart, it's beating like mad," said John, stepping towards me. He took my hand and put it against his chest. I could hear it racing, beating loudly and rushing into my ears until I could hear nothing but John's heart. After that tantalizing moment, the one where he usually realized that his hand was lingering, I noticed that his hand hadn't moved. He covered mine with him own, resting his fingers between mine, and our eyes met. The colour of his eyes and the feeling of his skin and the trembling of him so close to me, the thick, ragged breath he was drawing – my knees felt weak beneath me. I shuddered and gathered my thoughts, disordered by this sudden contact.

"Here, feel mine. Feel it. It's steady. Come on," I said, putting his hand to my chest, over my heart. Of course, my heart itself betrayed me; it had begun to pound the moment John had touched me. He didn't care. He put his hand over my heart and shut his eyes, as though it were the natural thing to do. Soon I felt my head rest lightly atop his, and we stayed like that – it could have been years, suspended in the bright, late sunlight, breathing his smell of hair and skin and lemon zest, listening to two heartbeats conjoined. There was beauty and good and it was in him. It was in my John and I felt like he'd finally fixed me.

Somehow, we broke apart. John smiled abashedly, then turned embarrassed, worried, frightened again. I looked down at him, at his full, blue eyes. He met my gaze.

"It's alright, John," I said, and he relaxed a little.

"Sherlock, I –"

And there was John Watson, caught in the same pain of not knowing, of sadness and of complete happiness that I knew so well. I couldn't mistake it.

"Yes?"

"I know it is."


	7. VII: Falling Slowly

**Hello, lovely readers. I feel dreadful for not updating sooner, but here is a very short installation. I've found this one the most difficult to write so far, accounting at least partially for the hiatus. I'll be updating more regularly soon, and thank you for all of the reviews and favorites. I love you all.**

**Edit: After a month of inactivity and general writing failure, I've decided to end the story here. I've been trying to get around the ending of this in order to round the fic off to ten chapters, but it did no good. I think I like how Sherlock and John are, suspended in this moment. I've got a plot bunny for another Johnlock fic that needs seeing to, so that might end up here soon too. Thanks for reading, dear Johnlock shippers of my heart. **

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><p>Chapter Seven<p>

I didn't know where we were going. Standing unmoving and still impossibly close to one another, we could only breathe for the long moments after we had broken apart. Our eyes strayed over each other, but I wanted to look at him, his eyes. They still transfixed and bewitched me, after all this time, made me shake. My mind was racing and at once, still. John spoke and my heart was suddenly leaping madly, like a banner across a vivid sky. The sun lit his face, gilded his hair and his skin and I loved him so much, standing there in his shaft of dusty, old light.

"Sherlock –" He paused, thinking, drawing a long breath. I was suddenly conscious of my trembling hands and weak knees. "Sherlock –"

"I'm shaking, John," I said suddenly, for no reason. He took one of my hands; his were warm, whereas mine was cold. He just held it there, warming it with his hands, and I ached for him to be holding me, for me to be holding him in turn and for him to be the part of me that had been lost, or fallen away, or turned into a ghost long ago. He was half of a whole, half of the whole of me and of him. He slowly let go of my hand; I had stopped my shaking.

"Sherlock, what I said about us – long ago, we'd just met – about following you. Wherever you go, if it's death or – or wherever else, I'm coming with you. I said that because you're my best friend. You're my best friend and you're – you're my only one too. I was so alone, Sherlock, and I owe you everything. I owe you so much. And – and I want to be with you. I want to be with you and I don't care what happens because I know that much, that we're going to be together no matter what. And I sound like a bloody idiot right now, but that's why it's alright, Sherlock. It's alright."

My heart vanished for a moment, but I smiled at John, at the sight of him.

"I know. I know that. And I know that I want to be with you and that – that you're nothing less than everything I have, John," I said, my voice breaking through my smile. "Nothing less than everything."

John studied me for a moment, and I worried that I had said something wrong. Then a wide, John-like grin broke over his face and he laughed a little.

"You sound a complete prat right now."

I was stung for a moment, then John's laughter grew harder at my blank expression.

"A joke, Sherlock," he said finally, giggling at the end of his sentence. He gave me his roguish smile again, and we dissolved into laughter that ran up my ribs and hurt in the best of ways, until we couldn't laugh anymore. We fell into each other, still giggling, and I wrapped my arms around him, holding him tight against me. His head found the hollow of my throat, my head its place atop his. His hands rested on the arch of my shoulders, mine across the taut stretch of his back. We breathed in the scent of each other, his of hair and skin and lemons and cardamom and disinfectant handwash from St. Bart's and grass and sun-dust and him. John murmured something against the skin of my throat that I only half-heard; the movement of his lips against my neck raised goosebumps all over my body. I couldn't understand my feelings, racing and diving and hurtling towards not knowing anything but that John was mine and I his.

After another long moment, he pulled away from me a little.

"I love you." He said it with uncertainty, gingerly. He was unused to it, just as I was.

"I love you, John. I love you," I replied, and he smiled broadly.

It was alright, and nothing less than everything.


End file.
